PREP GIRLS BASKETBALL: Storm hope to defend county title

Jan. 11—DANVILLE — Ever since the return of Alexa Jamison last month, the Salt Fork girls basketball team has battled back some tough teams, including Cissna Park on Monday.

"We've played a pretty tough schedule and having everyone on the court has helped," Salt Fork coach Brian Russell said. "Each player contributes at a high level and that has helped our team being successful. We are playing great team ball and that is what it is all about."

It is not a surprise, then, that the Storm are the top seed in the Vermilion County Girls Basketball Tournament that will begin on Friday in Danville Area Community College's Mary Miller Gym.

But Russell and the Storm are not going to be overlooking anyone in trying to win their second straight county title.

"Everyone in our county has the potential to win every night. You have to bring your A game every night and that is what we are focusing on," Russell said. "We have to go out and take care of business. It should be a competitive tournament and we are looking forward to it."

The Storm will start play on Monday against Armstrong-Potomac and will take on Georgetown-Ridge Farm on Wednesday.

The second seed in the tournament is Hoopeston Area. The Cornjerkers have battled through tournaments and early play with a young team and some injuries.

"We had a tough schedule to start with one senior. She was hurt at the Oakwood tournament, but we have been on a roll lately," Hoopeston Area coach Aaron Fell said. "I thought it would have been us or Bismarck taking the second seed, but we had two injuries happen before Christmas break and we have been struggling since then. Hopefully, we will get one of them back before the county tournament.

"Our senior, Kaitlynn Lange, has a shoulder injury and our freshman Mady Klaber, who was averaging 14 points per game the last few games before Christmas, got injured as well. We hope to get Kaitlynn back before the tournament and Mady during the tournament. She (Klaber) is going to come back rusty but give us a lot at the point."

In Fell's second season, the Cornjerkers are dealing with more underclassmen, but with a better connection to the area, will get more players ready for the future.

"We worked a lot with our middle school and we have a lot of girls that were in middle school on the team," Fell said. "We will have 5-8 freshmen next year, so we have some good talent coming in and I think we will have one of our best seasons next year."

Hoopeston Area will face Westville on Friday, Oakwood on Monday and Bismarck-Henning/Rossville-Alvin on Thursday.

We have played them (Westville) twice already and they have been very good games," Fell said. "All you need is one shooter getting hot and that's the ball game. We are a pressing team and playing on the big court doesn't fare well. It seems Oakwood always play well against us and they are coming off beating Milford on Tuesday."

The tournament is back at DACC after an successful return last season and both Russell and Fell said it will be great to return to that atmosphere again.

"I think the junior college does a great job putting on the tournament. They do a great job hyping up the boys and girls teams," Russell said. "Just their effort to put everything into is very special, so we appreciate what DACC does for every athlete that goes out there. It was definitely a great production and we hope that they can do it again this year."

"I loved the atmosphere at DACC last season with the locker rooms, the college look, the crowd and how games are recorded and televised. It is a great experience," Fell said.